Bakers Journal August/September 2017 : Page 10

and for a few days after Easter. This year, they made it manda-tory for staff to take one week in the summer as well. Work/life balance : The bakery offers employees one unpaid hour per shift that they can use to workout. Miller and Rudderham negotiated reduced gym fees with the facility across the street. Most of the bakery’s staff (about 80 per cent the owners estimate), are on four day weeks with nine or 10-hour shifts. “It’s really about seeing the human behind the shift,” says Rudderham. “We don’t create shifts and then try to fill them. We go to the employee and say ‘does this work for you?’ and trial them.” Recruitment/retention : Over the years, hiring has evolved into a four-step process. Applicants first interview with the department manager, then the owners, work a trial shift, and then start a three-month probation period. In exchange for the bakery’s commitment to its staff, the owners ask each new hire to commit to two years. This is a promise in spirit, and there is nothing that can be done if someone decides to go sooner. It is a principle that the owners are looking to see that demonstrates commitment on both sides. When asked what each were looking for in a candidate, Miller says, “I am the more emotional business partner and I feel it in my gut.” “I am looking for a generosity of spirit,” says Rudderham. “Everyone works hard and everyone has a slightly different skill set, but everyone is contributing equally, so you need kind of a generosity of spirit to embrace that. You can be competitive and still be generous.” She is also looking for candidates with similar values that they can build on. Training : The bakery developed a passport program that lists tasks to be completed during the probation period, including working two hours in each department. FINDING THE SIGNATURE SELLER Cake & Loaf morphed from an utterly comprehensive bakery to a streamlined comprehensive bakery. There are five depart-ments at the Dundern street location: cake, pastry, savoury, bread and front of house. The confectionary department is housed at the farmer’s market. The bakery sells local coffee beans, artisan jarred goods like jams and peanut butters, and even company branded tea towels and clothes. In the early days, the owners were hiring new staff and the burgeoning team was churning out ideas left right and centre, plus up and down . “Initially we were doing too much,” says Miller. “We were making every product that any customer could ever want. Slowly we learned to focus, downsize, and supply items that we knew would excel at.” Now, the line-up is fine-tuned and what’s available is seasonal to a T, says Miller. Things come off the menu as the local produce also stops being available. “The top seller right now in terms of revenue is Grab n’ Go cakes,” says Rudderham. “And for years we couldn’t sell a Grab n’ Go cake to save our lives.” A Grab n’ Go cake is a six-inch cake with three layers of cake and three layers of filling with the flavours based seasonally. The bakery can add a plaque for customers. The idea is that people can come in and purchase a high quality cake without having to go through an ordering process. “We tried to play with it, but we couldn’t find space in the 10 BAKERS JOURNAL / AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2017 Salted caramels are a signature of the confectionary department. pastry case because once again we had so much products,” says Miller of earlier days. “We streamlined and we had a little more space…and then it just blew up.” Chicken pot pies are also a perennially popular seller. “I am so proud of how consistent our pot pies are because it’s made from scratch, and it’s a challenge to make it exactly the same every time,” says Rudderham. The bakery sources its chicken from Fenwood Farm in nearby Ancaster. The bakery provides pies each week to be sold at the farm, delivered while picking up chicken. Great care has been taken to source locally, and this has left the bakery with a “million” suppliers, says Rudderham, which can be frustrating. The owners’ goal was to support local farms, and they accomplished this by creating relationships with the smallest farms that could supply them. The cream egg brownie is a staple seller. Last year they sold 5200 in six weeks. The fudge brownie has a white chocolate fudge layer, which is yellow at Easter, and shop-made cream egg goes in the centre with milk chocolate on top. The OMG bar is “a play off what my Mom used to make all the time,” say Miller. “It’s like Domino cupcakes, but we made it in bar form. It’s chocolate cake with chocolate chip cheese-cake embedded in it, then cream cheese icing, and decoration. www.bakersjournal.com